SLOKA 134 FROM DANCING WITH SIVA
ARE THERE OTHER TYPES OF SACRED TEXTS?
India’s lofty philosophical texts expound diverse views in exacting dialectics. Yoga treatises unveil the mysterious path to ultimate samadhis. Intimate devotional hymns disclose the raptures of consummate Divine love. Aum.
BHASHYA
In addition to the epics, legends and supplements to the Vedas and Agamas, there is a wealth of Hindu metaphysical, yogic and devotional writings. Considered foundational are the early texts defining the six philosophical darshanas: the sutras by Kapila, Patanjali, Jaimini, Badarayana, Kanada and Gautama. Hailed as leading occult works on yoga, asanas, nadis, chakras, kundalini and samadhi are the Yoga Sutras, Tirumantiram, Yoga Vasishtha, Siva Sutras, Siddha Siddhanta Paddhati, Jnaneshvari, Hatha Yoga Pradipika and Gheranda Samhita. Widely extolled among the bhakti literature are the Bhagavad Gita, Narada Sutras, Tiruvasagam, the Vachanas of the Sivasharanas and the hymns of mystic poets like Surdas, Tukaram, Ramprasad, Mirabai, Andal, Vallabha, Tulasidasa, Tayumanavar, Lalla, Tagore, Auvaiyar and the saintly Nayanars and Alvars. The Bhagavad Gita explains, ”As a blazing fire reduces the wood to ashes, O Arjuna, so does the fire of knowledge reduce all activity to ashes. There is nothing on earth which possesses such power to cleanse as wisdom. The perfect yogin finds this knowledge in himself by himself in due time.” Aum Namah Sivaya.
LESSON 134 FROM LIVING WITH SIVA
SANCTITY OF THE HOME
From the point of view of the Second World, or astral plane, the home is the family temple, and the wife and mother is in charge of that spiritual environment. The husband can come into that sanctum sanctorum but should not bring the world into it. He will naturally find a refuge in the home if she is doing her duty. He will be able to regain his peace of mind there, renew himself for the next day in the stressful situations that the outside world is full of. In this technological age a man needs this refuge. He needs that inner balance in his life. When he comes home, she greets him at the entrance and performs a rite of purification and welcome, offering arati to cleanse his aura. This and other customs protect the sanctity of the home. When he enters that sanctuary and she is in her soul body and the child is in its soul body, then he becomes consciously conscious in his soul body, called anandamaya kosha in Sanskrit. He leaves the conscious mind, which is a limited, external state of mind and not a balanced state of mind. He enters the intuitive mind. He gets immediate and intuitive answers to his worldly problems.
How can he not be successful in his purusha dharma in the outside world when he has the backing of a good wife? She is naturally perceptive, naturally intuitive. She balances out his intellect, softens the impact of the forces which dash against his nervous system from morning to night. Encouragement and love naturally radiate out from her as she fulfills her stri dharma. Without these balancing elements in his life, a man becomes too externalized, too instinctive.
If a woman is working, she cannot provide this balance. She has to start thinking and acting like a man. She has to become a little tougher, create a protective shell around her emotions. Then the home loses its balance of the masculine and the feminine forces. Take for example the situation in which the wife rushes home from work fifteen minutes before the husband. She’s upset after an especially hard day at work. The children come over from Grandmother’s house or she tells the babysitter to go home. She scurries to prepare something for dinner before he comes home, then rushes to get herself looking halfway decent. Emotionally upset, she tries to calm herself, tries to relax and regain her composure. Her astral body is upset. The children’s astral bodies are upset. The husband enters this agitated environment–already upset by being in the world–and he becomes more disturbed. He was looking forward to a quiet evening. But is he going to get it? No. He begins to feel neglected, disappointed, and that leads him to become distraught, to say angry words that make everything even worse. The pranic forces are spinning out of control. It’s seems like a totally impossible situation for both of them. Furthermore, it’s not going to get better, but exceedingly worse, as the days wear on.
SUTRA 134 OF THE NANDINATHA SUTRAS
CARING FOR ELDERS
Siva’s followers who are householders care for their parents and close relatives all through life. The elderly especially must be comforted, honored at auspicious times and never left alone for extended periods. Aum.
LESSON 134 FROM MERGING WITH SIVA
LORD GANESHA, THE GATEKEEPER
Lord Ganesha is the first God a Hindu comes to know. As the Lord of Categories, His first objective is to bring order into the devotee’s life, to settle him into the correct and proper flow of his dharma–the pattern of duties, responsibilities and expectations suited to the maturity of his soul. As the Lord of Obstacles, He deftly wields His noose and mace, dislodging impediments and holding avenues open until the individual is set in a good pattern, one that will fulfill his spiritual needs rather than frustrate them.
Always remember that Ganesha does not move swiftly. He is the elephant God, and His gait is slow and graceful. As the God of the instinctive-intellectual mind, His darshans are carried on the slower currents of mind, and so His response to our prayers is usually not overnight or sudden and electric, but more deliberate and gradual. Yet, our patience is rewarded, for His work is thorough and powerful, of matchless force persisting until our lives and minds adjust and our prayer has become reality.
Lord Ganesha is also known as the Gatekeeper. Access to all the other Gods comes through Him. It is not that He would want to keep anyone from another God, but He prepares you to meet them and makes the meeting an auspicious one. This preparation can mean lifetimes. There is no hurry. It is not a race. Ganesha will faithfully bar access to those who do not merit a divine audience and an ensuing relationship with the other Deities whose darshans are faster. Should a devotee gain unearned access and invoke the powers of other Deities before all preparations were concluded, karma would accelerate beyond the individual’s control. Worship of Lord Ganesha, however, may begin at any time.
Ganesha is the ubiquitous God. There are more shrines, altars and temples for Lord Ganesha than for any other God. Ganesha bhakti is the most spontaneous worship and the simplest to perform. It requires little ritual. Just the ringing of a small bell at the outset of a project before His picture or the burning of camphor or the offering of a flower is enough to invoke His presence and protection. Throughout India and Sri Lanka, there are small, unadorned shrines to Ganapati under shaded trees, along country roads, at bus terminals, along footpaths and in the city streets. His blessings are indeed everywhere. Helping Ganesha, whose powers of mind outreach the most advanced computers we can conceive, are His ganas, or devonic helpers. These ministering spirits collect the prayers of those in need, ferret out and procure the necessary information and bring it before Lord Ganesha’s wisdom.
As we come closer to the wonderful Gods of Hinduism, we come to love them in a natural way, to be guided by them and to depend on them more than we depend on ourselves. The exuberant enthusiasm so prevalent in the West, of holding to an existential independence and expressing an autonomous will to wield the direction of our lives, loses its fascination as we mature within the steady radiance of these Gods and begin to realize the divine purpose of our Earthly sojourn.
One might ask how the Hindu can become so involved in the love of the Gods that he is beholden to their will? Similarly, one might ask how does anyone become so involved and in love with his mother and father, trusting their guidance and protection, that he is beholden to them? It works the same way. Where you find the Hindu family close to one another and happy, you find them close to the Gods. Where they are not close, and live in a fractured or broken home, the Gods will unfortunately have been exiled from their lives. They will not be invoked, and perhaps not even believed in.
